Dissonance
by catherwauling
Summary: It was my brother and I against the world—and I needed to even the odds. (SI/OC)
1. Prologue

**AN:** So my laptop randomly decided to delete most of Eight Prison Doors and my life is enough of a mess for me to give zero shits about starting a bunch of low-consequence things I probably won't be able to finish with my rampantly annoying health issues. And so somehow this happens. (This is just pure wish-fulfillment trash, with a side of introversion. Or maybe the other way around.)

I don't own Naruto.

* * *

 **Prologue**

* * *

I'm aware stranger things have happened. According to historical record, most of the forests around Fire Country were jutsu'd into existence by a rambunctious Senju whose lover's spat with a crazy-eyed megalomaniac carved out a massive trench now called the Valley of the End. Said Senju's brother thought it'd be a neat idea to create a forbidden technique to pull a departed soul from the Pure World into a living person, because necromancy is a _thing_ that happens for _reasons_. The Yondaime supposedly called upon the Death God itself to defeat a giant angry chakra monster—while atop an equally-giant warrior-toad wielding a sword bigger than the Hokage Tower—because kami forbid the legendary Yellow Flash go out in any less spectacular and convoluted a manner.

In a world in which gods could be shackled to mortals, souls were quantifiable things that could be manipulated with enough seals and creativity, and everybody was somebody's tragic hero—

Reincarnation wasn't the weirdest thing out there. It might be _odd_ to suddenly wake up with the memories of another life, but it's no stranger than giant summon animals giving misleading prophecies to overpowered perverts, women pushing fifty punching mountains into dust on an off day, or evil purple eyes that could tell reality to go cry in a corner until someone ripped them out of their sockets.

Then again, I might just be trying to make sense of the nonsensical. Because according to these memories, I was once a neurotic twenty-something civilian academic from a world in which there were large, cylindrical exploding tags that could blow up cities the size of small countries, people thought spending a large part of their nation's economy planting a flag on the moon was a neat idea, and the most powerful country in the world armed their untrained civilians with a ludicrous degree of firepower because of some mad political experiment in which daimyos were elected and were also the Kage-in-chief, _whatever that meant_.

Not to mention that there was some idiot prophet called "Kishimoto" who thought detailing the combat capabilities and dirty secrets of some of the most terrifying shinobi on the continent was something he could actually survive—because, again, evil purple eyes that could apparently jump between dimensions.

Anyways.

Whether these memories really did once belong to some foreigner from a different world, or whether I'd snapped and somehow constructed an eerily accurate and elaborate fantasy for myself in my head—

It didn't make much of a difference.

I was fairly sure I was insane, either way.

Because my name was Uzumaki Rin, and according to these memories, I wasn't supposed to exist.

* * *

My first memory, from this life, is of the _pitter-patter_ of familiar chakra sputtering out of existence, leaving me alone with my twin and his tenant, which felt not at all like a demon and more like something I'd spent ten long months beside.

Naruto, of course, doesn't remember a thing. Other than his whisker-marked cheeks and his impossible energy, to me, he was a normal kid. His formative years were a blur for him, and I was the one known constant in his life. I was his first memory; he didn't care much about the details.

I, on the other hand, knew more than I should even before the knowledge of a past life slammed into my head. I knew that there was a pale-faced brunette woman that would visit us some nights at the orphanage, who felt like cold ash and argued with the matron over our care. I knew that my brother and I were watched, every night and every day, whether by the caretaker or by masked men in white armor that lurked in the shadows of the Hashirama trees. I started walking months before my brother; reading and writing years before my peers; I felt too small in my body, as if my bones had been built wrong. I could feel what I thought was my blood pump in my veins; only later, in the Academy, would I find out that it was my chakra.

In a way, _reincarnation_ made more sense than anything did.

And in a way, it didn't make sense at all. I could literally feel the weight of my own existence in my body, like a river digging a long wound into the earth. Hunger pangs were more constant than friendships, what with the matron constantly punishing my brother and the much more reasonable fear that the other kids had of me. Just as I remembered being a woman who thought no more or less of dying than of living, I remembered holding Naruto close as he cried our first night living by ourselves, never even learning about the word _suicide_ and being baffled when I did. Survival was paramount; _why would I ever want to leave my brother alone?_

In these foreign memories, Rin was just the name of a girl that threw herself into the path of her teammate's assassination jutsu. Said teammate was the son of the White Fang, who had committed seppuku after failing a mission and thus lighting the match that would start the Third Shinobi War. Both children were the students of the Yondaime, who'd left his kid (singular, son) alone in the world with half a bijū sealed up inside him, to forever fight the other half in the stomach of the Shinigami. Naruto wasn't just the name of a boy, but the hero of a story in which nobody who died stayed dead forever, who saved the very world that once damned him to a miserable childhood.

And for a while, I thought that believing in these new memories would be a kind of suicide. It would be denying my own existence despite all the evidence to the contrary. It would mean that I never really mattered; never _should_ have mattered; _Uzumaki Rin should never have been born_.

* * *

A week later, I thought, _fuck that_ , and came back home to my baby brother.

* * *

I'm sure I got over the revelation sooner than was entirely healthy. Not that I have anyone to compare myself to; I couldn't really go around asking strangers if they suffered delusions of having lived in another reality. That was just asking for the Sandaime to lock me up in the hospital again—which, not so coincidentally, was something that happened for a week after I woke up screaming my throat out and babbling incoherently (in a mix of English and very poor Korean, two languages that just did not exist in my current reality). I'd barely avoided being suspended from the Academy for some quality time with a Yamanaka like that Uchiha boy who had his whole family massacred not that long ago. Considering what I now knew of the matter, being mind-walked by a Konoha shinobi was a fate I desperately wanted to avoid.

It wasn't everyday that a seven-year-old girl was told she shouldn't actually exist; that her twin brother, who couldn't take care of himself if his life depended on it (which it _did_ ) was supposed to have lived alone after he got kicked out of the orphanage; was supposed to have raised himself without anyone to stand up for him against the grocer that jacked up his prices, or the civilian family that spat at him as they moved out from next door, or—the countless other civilians and shinobi alike that treated us like _trash_.

Maybe, if Naruto and I had a better childhood—had the respect of our village and a budget beyond the Academy allowance for orphaned legacies, or hell, had an adult that we could trust to do all the worrying for us—I'd have had more of an existential crisis. Reality, of course, intervened pretty quickly; I was busy practicing the henge so that I could afford to pick up groceries for the week, and making sure Naruto cleaned up after getting mud all over himself during a fight with some bullies from the Academy. I'd spent a week in a hospital bed worrying about myself already, and with a trouble-magnet of a brother to take care of along with my own studies, I just—didn't have the time to be so distracted.

So what if my brother was a jinchūriki? He was still an idiot that couldn't wash the dishes properly, or cook anything with rice without getting bored and boiling a cup of instant ramen instead. He was still the only person I really cared for in this world; he could literally want to burn down the village, and I'd happily pass him a scroll with a decent fire jutsu. I wasn't the kind of girl that felt the need to save everyone she could, just because some distant relative with delusions of grandeur might, in less than a decade, flatten most of Konoha in a fit. I was the kind of girl that would make sure she and her brother got the hell out of Fire Country before something like that could happen, and maybe scavenge for supplies in the ruins to support her new life as an unaffiliated ninja.

One day, I might hitch a ride with whoever ended up with the magic purple-eyes to the world the woman in my memories had come from; find and track down the seer that dared profit off my brother's suffering, and make use of what I'd learned during the Academy's introductory T&I unit—like a good little kunoichi should.

Until then?

It was my brother and I against the world—and I needed to even the odds.


	2. Legacy Arc: First Steps

**AN:** In which Uzumaki Rin is revealed to be a major nerd, as well as a paranoid basket-case. I don't own Naruto.

* * *

 **Legacy Arc:** First Steps

* * *

I'd known the Sandaime was dangerous even before I was hit with my past life's memories. Sarutobi Hiruzen had been a frontline combatant in two of the three bloodiest wars since the end of the Warring Clans Era; he'd been anointed Hokage when he was just a teenager, as the last command of the infamous Senju Tobirama. He was the reason the largely unremarkable Sarutobi clan, a lineage without the advantages of a bloodlimit or special technique, became one of the most prominent families in a village that was founded on the strength of its clans. That was all historical record; part of the lectures on Konoha's history given to first-year Academy students. Reason enough to be afraid of him: he was a historical figure that survived his accomplishments. For a ninja, that was almost unheard of.

To my brother, however, the Sandaime was an old man as lost in his pipe as he was with his paperwork. An aging administrator, whose only distinction was his Kage robes and ceremonial hat. Dear Naruto had been considerably underwhelmed by the "grandpa" that was in charge of the village; as far as he was concerned, his elders were crotchety bullies that would have spat on us if they weren't liable to choke first—like the couple that lived across the street from the orphanage who'd done nothing but gawk at us as we were dragged out of the building by our ears, to be left in the streets until our ANBU watcher decided to take us to the Hokage.

It was that first meeting that somehow endeared the old man to my baby brother; it was also when I'd first developed a healthy sense of paranoia towards elders with kind smiles and smouldering chakra. I may have always been terrible with the faces people made and what they meant, but I'd felt the energies of those around me since before I was properly born.

He may have smiled at my brother; he may have thought he was being kind.

The taste of hot coals in my mouth told me he'd curled up his rage into a ball, and I knew I didn't ever want to be caught up in its explosion.

Sarutobi Hiruzen was a man with the temper of the sun, who'd learned to bury it deep while keeping the placid veneer of a tired bureaucrat on the surface. He may have been called the Professor for his academic bent, but he was also a man known as the Second God of Shinobi, and was powerful enough to take back the hat after the chaos following the Kyūbi attack and the death of the Yondaime.

And he was who I most needed to convince that nothing was wrong with my mind.

—Which, honestly, was such a lost cause, it wasn't even funny.

Before I learned about my reincarnation, I'd not known half the consequences of the village's scrutiny of my odd behaviour. There was a name given to kids like me, who could speak like an adult before they even entered the Academy, and always knew more than they should. It was the same name given to Sharingan no Kakashi when he was sent out to war before his tenth birthday, and Shunshin no Shisui, when he was drafted into ANBU.

It was what they'd called Uchiha Itachi, before he massacred his clan and "deserted" the village.

 _Prodigy child_.

I'd never considered the children at the orphanage to be my peers; they'd been too afraid of me for that, too wary of the matron's scrutiny over my "demon" brother. As a consequence, I had no one to really compare myself to other than Naruto, who'd always been more of a little brother to me than a twin. I couldn't concern myself with how I looked when I needed to defend him from bullies, or demand he get fed just the same as the other kids; what mattered were his thin cheeks and his stomach pains, his matted yellow hair, the bruises on his feet.

Then there was that first meeting with the Sandaime, in which he enrolled us in the Academy and helped us sort out our legacy funds; got us set up with a one-room apartment a short walk from the main markets.

I'd done what I always did, and made sure Naruto got his fair share.

One week later, I'd found myself in a class alongside ten and eleven-year-olds, while my brother was sorted into a room stuffed with first-year clan heirs.

I was on the prodigy track, set for early graduation.

Then the memories of another life woke me screaming in a foreign language, blood dribbling from my mouth from nearly biting through my tongue—just a month after the genius Uchiha heir "snapped" and killed his family.

I'm not sure why I was allowed to go home after only a week in the psychiatric ward. Why I was allowed to return to Academy classes when the Konoha Council had just introduced new restrictions on early advancement. My new memories might have told me the "truth" behind the massacre, but a thirteen-year-old boy had still assassinated the bulk of the village's Police Force under orders from a questionable authority figure who had torn out his cousin's eye.

Not to mention that my "peculiarities" weren't exactly a secret.

The caretakers at the orphanage had called me a freak behind closed doors; drew lots to see who would watch me for the day. The landlady to our apartment had spoken to me once, then never came to visit again; she sent us notices via slips of paper tucked under the door. The regular instructors at the Academy pretended I didn't exist, wordlessly handing back my assignments and avoiding me in the hallways. Suzume-sensei was better with me, but talked differently to me than the other kunoichi-in-training; she was an infiltration specialist and a veteran of the Third Shinobi War, and pointedly showed only what she wanted others to see.

The massacre of a founding clan wasn't something the village would forget overnight, not with consequences that would spiral out for years to come. The Nidame had given the Uchiha the "honour" of becoming the village's internal security, and for decades, red-and-white fans were ubiquitous throughout Konoha's many districts. Overnight, they'd disappeared; explanations to civilians and lower-ranked shinobi were terse, if not nonexistent. The whereabouts of the genius prince, lauded as the next Namikaze Minato, were unknown; rumours spread like cursed fire through the Hashirama trees.

The official explanation had been worse than any of the rumours.

Konoha might have been founded as a military village—the union between the warmongering Senju and Uchiha clans—but it had attracted a significant civilian population over its history. Most minor clan compounds were sprawled alongside shopkeepers and seasonal vendors, and non-combatants (both civilians and retired shinobi) outnumbered those on active duty. At the village's peak, shortly before the Kyūbi attack, the population of Konoha rivaled that of Fire Country's capitol; having kept its walls mostly secure throughout the course of a major war had attracted both the merchant class and a large number of refugees.

To civilians, even those that lived in a Hidden Village, shinobi were shadow operatives with inhuman powers that did the nation's dirty work. Just as it would be unheard of for a six-year-old in my past life's dimension to be a ranking officer of a major military, soldiers that could breathe fire and turn letters into explosives were an out-of-context problem for the vast majority of the Elemental Countries. And yet civilians were the source of the bulk of our missions; from feuding nobles to jealous merchant princes and stilted husbands from wealthy families. There was a mandatory seminar all Academy students had to take on how to behave around civilian clients, and the bulk of Suzume-sensei's lectures were on how to act like "normal" girls. Konoha, though derided as the "nice" village by the more militaristic Kumo and Iwa, struck a tenuous balance between "terrifying" and "approachable" in order to attract customers and secure funding from the daimyo.

Uchiha Itachi had gone and lit up that balance with a Katon jutsu.

Needless to say, when I'd woken up strapped to a hospital bed, I had expected the worst. (And that was in the minutes before my recollection of what happened hit me like a speeding brick.)

I'm fairly sure it was some kind of nepotism that had me out and back with my brother with little but a warning and a reinstated ANBU patrol. Hard as it was to wrap my head around the fact that Naruto and I were the children of the Yondaime (and that the Sandaime's story of naming us after Uzumaki Mito for our then-unspecified "service to the village" was a really transparent lie) I could see how it coloured our interactions with the old man—and his obvious fondness for my sibling, despite his loud behaviour and his tendency to stomp over glass.

Or—maybe he reminded him of our mother. I'm pretty sure Naruto yelled at the Hokage again; he seemed strangely pleased when I came home, like he'd pulled off a particularly vicious prank.

 _Anyways_.

In that mess of politics and conspiracies and village secrets, here I come along, the sister of the demon container, a girl with a record of having a few screws loose, screaming bloody murder before being knocked out by a patrolling ANBU and detained for having a psychotic break.

And now I'm sitting across from the God of Shinobi, the man who signed off on the order for a teenager to murder his parents and become a missing-nin, trying to figure out a way to convince him that I'm totally fine, and wouldn't it just be a waste of everyone's time to call in a Yamanaka for no good reason.

So of course, the first thing I say is—

"When are you going to tell Naruto that he's a jinchūriki?"

—Because I'm supposed to be a genius, or something.

* * *

I'd forever treasure the memory of the old man choking on the stem of his pipe. And thanks to my atypical sensor abilities, I knew that I wasn't the only witness; there were at least three ANBU behind hidden partitions in the office, their chakra sparking like fuses on fireworks.

At least, I _would_ , if I wasn't afraid that "forever" was the short time between now and when the Sandaime had me executed.

If I remembered correctly, my brother's jinchūriki status was supposed to be an S-Rank secret; violators were guilty of treason against the village, meaning that they could be locked up in T&I or just outright executed, depending on the Hokage's mood. I'm not sure if whoever first leaked the information to the public was ever caught, but Konoha didn't have public executions; it liked to punish their traitors, but not flaunt their dirty laundry. The implicit threat of the Kage's justice was usually enough of a deterrent in any Hidden Village; there was a good reason why the military ruler was usually the strongest ninja around.

That said, there were plenty of people I could blame for having slipped me classified intelligence; it wasn't like the matron didn't know what she was doing when she called my brother the "demon brat" in front of all the other kids. I'd had plenty of occasion to overhear parents of Naruto's academy classmates warning their children away from him, calling him "unstable". As far as I was aware, none of our generation out-and-out knew about the seal on his stomach, but that didn't mean their relatives were always so circumspect. I could easily point to a civilian and claim that I'd overheard them while sneaking around; even as a kunoichi-in-training, my skills were good enough for that.

I wouldn't be able to convincingly accuse someone with any actual clout in the village, like a clan member or a chūnin from a ninja family, but there were plenty of others I'd prefer never step close to Naruto again, and I had absolutely no compunctions against getting them locked up or killed on a lie.

 _They hurt my brother; damn right I'd hurt them back, dattebane!_

It was unfortunate, then, that the Sandaime was no fool; I think he could tell he wouldn't get a straight answer from me. While my brother had always been eager to see him during our visits, I'd largely kept quiet unless I saw an opportunity to wheedle money for Naruto or put pressure on a disgruntled shopkeeper that refused to sell to us. That, and I didn't have complete control over my own chakra yet; if he had any affinity for sensing, he could probably just feel my animosity.

He didn't ask how I knew. Instead—

"When he becomes a genin, or turns thirteen. Whichever comes first."

My hands curled into fists. "Until then?"

He sighed, putting down his pipe. With a slight wave of his hand, I could feel the ANBU around us relax. "Until then, I expect you to keep this a secret from him. He's not yet prepared for the responsibility that knowledge entails."

I wasn't sure age or a promotion would fix that problem. How were you supposed to react to finding out you had a weapon of mass destruction sealed inside you? That you were the village's last defence against an enemy that would gleefully reduce it to rubble if given half the chance?

"It's not much of a secret," I argue. "All the adults seem to know."

"And yet none of his age-mates do. Nor is it widely known outside of the village." He shook his head. "It might not be the best kept secret, but this is for your brother's own safety."

A pause. "Is that what happened, Rin-chan?" he asked.

I blinked.

"You figured out your brother is the host of the Kyūbi," he frowned. "I'm sure you must have been shocked."

That was— _well_.

I wasn't expecting him to drop an explanation on my lap like a particularly morbid present. Did it even make sense? What did he think I did during the night, to somehow connect the dots to "the Yondaime didn't destroy the demon fox, so he must have sealed it inside my newborn brother, because _of course he would_." It wasn't like he knew I was aware of our heritage, or that the Uzumaki vitality made us ideal bijū containers. Wasn't it a much more likely explanation that someone spilled the beans? He himself just admitted that this particular truth leaked like a sieve.

For as badly kept the secret was among the adults, the specifics of what made a jinchūriki weren't exactly public knowledge. There was no way an Academy student could have pulled together the clues without outside help; the entire notion of ancient, animalistic chakra constructs of immense power were already an out-of-context problem, even to kids who were training to become ninja, many of whom would probably believe anything about powerful shinobi.

And—was having a breakdown a normal reaction for a girl who found out her brother was a jinchūriki? I had no clue; Naruto was the only container in the village, so it wasn't like there was anybody I could ask. It wasn't like my past life's memories had any analogues either; _that_ woman had been an only child, and her world didn't have chakra-based power asymmetries. Just—lots of small fireworks machines, that spat out water bullets made of metal. That, and overelaborate, mechanical paper bombs.

I—didn't know how to respond to this. Was he expecting me to agree? It wasn't like I could outright lie to the Hokage and get away with it; I wasn't even a genin yet.

Instead, I just shrugged.

The Sandaime sighed. "It's alright to be afraid."

Which— _how the hell?_ —actually seemed to work. I could feel his coals crumbling into ash, even as he sat up straight in his chair and fixed me with a look.

"I hope you understand, that your brother is not the demon that he contains," he said. "Naruto-kun has made a great sacrifice for the sake of the village, holding the Kitsune at bay."

I was still stuck on the God of Shinobi apparently accepting, "I realized my baby brother was a demon container and so I screamed until I bled and then passed out" as a legitimate explanation for what happened. Was this some kind of trick? Or—some political maneuver, to keep the daughter of the Yellow Flash from being expelled?

— _And_ _who did he think I was, anyways?!_ I didn't give a damn whether Naruto was the village idiot or the latest incarnation of a massive, angry chakra monster in a painfully orange jacket. He was my brother, the boy I'd practically raised since I could crawl and strike terror in whoever "forgot" to change his diapers. Where was the Sandaime when the matron locked us in a closet overnight over a broken vase, or when a vendor sold Naruto spoiled food that had me holding his head over the toilet while he threw up at three in the morning? Where was he when an older boy pushed my baby brother into a river, when the other kids laughed about him wanting to be a shinobi when he didn't even know how to swim?

I'm not sure how much of what I was thinking showed up on my face, but given that he subtly made the _stand down_ gesture again, _I was pretty sure he got the message._

Embers flickered to life. He leaned back in his chair, and—

"I'm glad to see you do, Rin-chan. Naruto is lucky to have you as a sister."

He smiled at me. Like he always did to my brother. Black coals fed the heat of a small flame. He looked—more like the old man Naruto saw him as; less like a hardened war veteran who could order a genocide and believe it necessary.

Somehow, I couldn't help but feel like I'd just been played.

* * *

By the time I came back to our apartment, Naruto was deep into his second cup of ramen, curled up atop the counter of the "kitchen"—little more than a stove-top, a cupboard, and a small fridge, liberally decorated with pots, a kettle, and leftovers from what I'd made for breakfast this morning.

"You're late!" he mumbled through a mouthful. A bit of soup dripped down onto his shirt.

I sighed. "I had to pick up my homework from the Academy, and Suzume-sensei wasn't there to make things easier."

Which was more or less the truth. After the Hokage had dismissed me, I'd stopped by the teacher's lounge to check whether the kunoichi studies instructor was around. It was the weekend, which meant it was unlikely—Suzume rarely spent more time in the Academy building than she had to—but I wanted to know if news of my hospitalization had gone around, and she was the only one there who'd likely give me a straight answer. Which, considering she was an _infiltration specialist_ , probably said more about the other teachers than it did about her.

(I wasn't that concerned about overdue assignments. The only evaluations that mattered towards graduation were given at the end of each year; considering I'd been keeping up with students two to three years older than me _before_ I got dumped with a ridiculous amount of village secrets and combat strategies, I'd only fail if the Hokage decided to hold me back.)

Naruto frowned. "Do I need to teach anyone a lesson again?" By which he meant, _which of the instructors should I prank next_?

I thought about that for a moment. Wasn't some chūnin supposed to trick my brother into stealing the Forbidden Scroll, at some point?

"Who's the white-haired guy with the funny mouth?" I asked.

"Mizuki-sensei?"

"Yeah, that guy."

Naruto's smile was full of teeth. "That guy's such a bastard, yeah! Hey—what do you think he hides under that bandanna of his?"

I started putting away the dishes. "Um, his hair?"

He snickered. "Not for long, dattebayo!"

I smirked. "Finish your ramen, Naruto, we should clean up."

He stuck out his tongue at me before he quite finished chewing.

"That's disgusting."

"You're disgusting."

I paused, then breathed into my hand. "What, do I—smell bad, or something?" I'd long since learned to trust his nose over mine, any day; the boy could pick up what the neighbour had for last night's dinner from where he was sitting.

"No, silly," he laughed. "Girls are disgusting!"

"Girls are disgusting," I echoed. Was this something I missed by skipping ahead at the Academy?

"That's what Kiba said," he snickered, "then he got beat up by his mom, so now he says girls are awesome, but I know better than to believe him!"

Kiba—the brunette kid with the puffy jacket that ran around everywhere with a really small dog? I frowned. Last time Naruto had mentioned the Inuzaka boy, he'd gotten in a fight with him when the clan kid made fun of the bento I'd packed. Something about it being terrible.

Which was nonsense. Naruto loved my cooking.

I must have said some part of that aloud, because Naruto was nodding away. "Yeah, Kiba's pretty nice, when he's not busy being a total jerk. I hate guys like that, you know?"

I shook my head as I tucked away the last of the leftovers. "Sure, Naruto." He slurped up the last of his ramen, and I held a plastic bag open for him to throw away the container.

It was nice to know my little brother was making friends.

That was what was happening, right?

* * *

One of the more approachable caretakers at the orphanage had once asked me how I learned to read and write. "Books," I'd said, and stared at her like I thought she was an idiot. It was a marvelous way to get adults to shut up and go away.

The truth was, I didn't quite know how I understood the language. The woman whose memories I'd inherited had never formally learned Japanese, which was closest to the Konoha dialect of trade tongue I'd been able to make out. However, she had been an academic, and seemed to have no other hobbies than reading anything she could get her hands on. (Which made no sense. She had plenty of time to train, and there were exercises she could do to strengthen herself even in a world without chakra. I guess that was why she stayed a civilian? Her world did seem to be weird about kunoichi, in general.)

I do remember knowing intuitively that the blocky shapes spread across a page were characters I could sound out to form words. Somehow, in a couple of years I'd pieced together the basics of an entire written language, while my peers were still playing with blocks or running outside and making a mess of themselves. I'm not sure if it was latent memories of early language acquisition from a previous life, or some other absurdity of being born with an improperly recycled soul. Either way, I knew that I shouldn't have been able to learn what I'd never been taught.

I'm not sure how Naruto learned to read and write in that strange world in which I didn't exist; I couldn't imagine any of the Academy instructors taking extra time to catch him up on the basics. Besides him being the "demon brat", most of the teachers were experienced chūnin who taught for a year or two before returning to normal mission rotations, and even the career instructors took extra missions to supplement their income. Konoha had just been recovering from manpower losses suffered during the Third Shinobi War when the Kyūbi decimated not a small part of the village's active-duty forces; there simply weren't enough shinobi that could be spared.

That—might have explained how he became a genin without knowing what chakra was. The Naruto in that world hadn't been close to ready to taking out-of-village missions.

Like hell I would let my little brother on a C-Rank before he was fully prepared.

Which was why, during weekends, I'd force him to _sit down,_ crack open a book, and actually do his homework. He'd fidget like mad, and spend more time complaining than actually studying, but unlike me, he didn't know his chokeholds and pressure points.

I'd trained him to cower and _work_ like a good little shinobi every time I handed him a scroll.

Right now, he was grumbling while writing down multiplication tables in the last few pages of the tattered notebook I'd been forcing him to use all year. We were sitting across from each other at the low-rise table that took up a good chunk of our floor space; he was chewing on a pencil, and I was smiling behind my hands. He looked so _cute_ when he was thinking up ways to get back at me.

"This is stupid," he groaned. "Why do I need to learn this stuff?"

"For missions, Naruto," I explained. "Shinobi don't just hit things until their problems go away."

He looked sceptical. "Really? I'm pretty sure that's like, all they actually do."

I glared at him. "Get back to work."

He scowled. "Fine. But when I grow up to be a super-cool ninja, and end up never using any of this, I get to say I told you so."

That was fine by me. There was no way I was telling him most clanless Academy kids with poor written scores were sent to the genin corps during peacetime, or used as cannon fodder whenever the village put itself on a war footing. It wasn't like anyone would let the Kyūbi jinchūriki fade into obscurity, anyways; even the host of the Ichibi was currently being trained to be a crude siege weapon, if what my memories of Sabaku no Gaara were accurate.

Which reminded me—even though this Naruto had me around to force him to do his homework, he was still leagues behind his fellow jinchūriki. Sure he was the youngest, but most of his enemies in this life would be ninja; they wouldn't wait for him to grow up to become even more of a threat before taking him out. Meanwhile, most other hosts had body counts and Bingo Book entries with _do not engage_ orders for anyone under the rank of jōnin. Naruto might have the protection of the Sandaime, but when had that ever mattered when it should?

None of that was even touching on the A and S-Ranked criminals that wanted my brother out of the way or dead. Around now, Orochimaru would be leveraging the resources of the newfound Otogakure into forming an alliance with Suna, getting him access to the Yondaime Kazekage. Sooner or later, Momochi Zabuza would spark Kiri's latest civil war with his attempted assassination of Yagura—who himself was being controlled by Uchiha Obito with his Mangekyō Sharingan. Pein, Konan, and the rest of the Akatsuki were still raising funds for their core mission, but would eventually move to capture the jinchūriki, whether to rule the Elemental Countries through overwhelming power, or to cast an eternal illusion through the moon, or free the Usagi no Megami from her prison—

—Most of which I'd dismiss as _utter nonsense_ if those same memories hadn't just pulled me through a meeting with the Hokage, and warned me that there was an ancient goddess out there who wanted to hurt my brother and also destroy the world.

Unless I somehow managed to snag the Rinnegan so I could get us out of this dimension before our sixteenth birthdays, lots of very powerful people needed to die, and I needed to be strong enough to make sure it happened.

I wasn't going to let my baby brother fight an army of undead plant monsters, or a distant cousin with enough power to convince all of Amegakure that he was an actual god.

(And definitely not before he figured out long division.)

* * *

 **Next up:** Rin comes up with a hit list, uses her little brother as a sniffer dog, and Hatake Kakashi hates his life.


	3. Legacy Arc: Stumble Through

**AN:** Hatake Kakashi meets the Uzumaki twins. Poor bastard.

* * *

 **Legacy Arc:** Stumble Through

* * *

For all the theoretical assignments and battlefield studies we were given as Academy students, any actual available details of the Third Shinobi War tended to boil down to: _and then the Yellow Flash came and killed a bunch of Iwa-nin_. Which, if it were said about any other shinobi, would've been obvious propaganda even to uneducated orphan brats, or civilian-born hopefuls with no prior experience of the ninja world.

Except, when it came to the Yondaime, it was actually true.

The First and Second Wars had been conflicts of attrition, more than a series of clashes between titans. Sure, there were juggernauts like Kumo's infamous Kinkaku Butai, and most jinchūriki were armies by themselves—but a Hidden Village couldn't send all of its major offensive assets to one place, lest the enemy slip in a squad of jōnin through the border and wreak havoc.

The diverse geography of the Elemental Countries—from the deserts surrounding Sunagakure to the island networks of the Land of Waves—made rapid redeployment of war assets virtually impossible. If Iwa sent a platoon of their best frontline combatants to, say, try and fail to take down Akasuna no Sasori, and Kumo decided to exploit such a vulnerability in their numbers, whatever Iwa-nin survived would never be able to navigate the foreign canyons of Wind Country in time to prevent major strategic losses. And anything less than a full platoon might not be enough to stop Suna's Kugutsu Butai from quickly retaliating and advancing on the Land of Earth.

With variables like Sanshōuo no Hanzō in play, preventing armies from crossing through Amegakure, or Uzumaki seal masters providing their allies in the southern continent with a virtually unlimited number of storage scrolls and paper munitions, wars between Hidden Villages were more about asset denial and securing patrol routes for rapid communications, than they were about legendary battles between S-Rank shinobi.

That meant nations sent out barely-trained genin to staff outposts near their borders, and run patrols to secure internal logistics or courier supplies to frontline platoons. More often, their corpses were more useful to the village than their battlefield ability; if multiple units in a certain area failed to check in at a predetermined time, that sent an early warning to command that a major incursion might be in play, allowing them to redirect their chūnin and jōnin teams to counter an attack and possibly remove a major enemy asset from the board. During the height of the Third War, even Konoha began sending out newly-instated shinobi fresh from the Academy to die on the frontlines in order to delay or divert more powerful ninja.

Which was what ultimately earned the Densetsu no Sannin such a reputation in the Second War; not only did they stalemate with Hanzō—who had more or less singlehandedly fended off the Five Great Nations and turned the most vital chokepoint in the continent into his personal fiefdom—their advancements in seals and medical techniques were a tremendous force multiplier for the Hidden Village with the lowest absolute military strength among the warring states. Jiraya's Toad Summons could rapidly, if infrequently, transport him from one place to another through the Reverse Summoning Technique, and Orochimaru could counter enemy advancements in ninjutsu right there in the field. Tsunade was famed both for being the world's greatest medic _and_ for her inhuman strength; if a squad of Konoha-nin needed to get past a mountain, she could just punch it into dust. As fearsome as their combat capabilities were in the Bingo Books, it was their utility-focused techniques that helped get Konoha through a war they were otherwise largely unprepared for.

Then—the Yellow Flash came, and killed a bunch of Iwa-nin.

There was a reason the Yondaime was the first shinobi in history to merit a flee-on-sight order from every major Hidden Village. His prowess on the battlefield, while frightening enough, was on par with the Saikyō Taggu in terms of outright lethality, and even the most dangerous jinchūriki were considered priority targets in the battlefield ever since Senju Hashirama decided selling the bijū to every major power was somehow a wonderful idea.

Rather, it was the strategic implications of the Hiraishin—his instant teleportation technique—that completely upended conventional shinobi warfare, rendering entire networks of outposts and early-warning systems obsolete. If you didn't run, you wouldn't be able to report back to your superiors with the last known location of the Yellow Flash. If you somehow managed to escape, command could then write off entire sections of the countryside as, "likely marked liberally with the Hiraishin, do not enter without Kage-level support." Otherwise, you'd get massacres like when Iwagakure advanced a platoon across the fresh ruins of Kannabi Bridge, and the Yellow Flash decided to leave absolutely no survivors among the thousand-odd invading force.

It was why Kumo struck a non-agression pact with Iwa in order to focus their attention on Konoha, long considered to be the weakest of the Hidden Villages; why Kiri sent a squad of hunter-nin deep into Fire Country to try and deploy the Sanbi like an overpriced explosive tag, despite meaning it could end up short a jinchūriki just when its conventional forces were nearly depleted. Because sooner or later, Namikaze Minato would stick a three-pronged kunai deep enough into the Land of Earth, and teleport the Bloody Habanero right on top of Iwagakure.

And then there would be no more Iwagakure.

The Hiraishin upended conventional norms of warfare entrenched by three long, bloody wars, and was all the remarkable for what it was not: Namikaze Minato was an orphan without a carefully cultivated lineage, or a powerful bloodlimit, or a bijū in his stomach. He was just a man with an inordinate interest in history and fūinjutsu, who took the Nidaime's space-time combat technique and turned it into a weapon of mass destruction. Which meant that, unlike Senju Hashirama's Wood Release or the Uchiha's Sharingan, the Yellow Flash could theoretically _teach_ _anybody_ how to teleport across the continent and drop a brace of explosive tags in the middle of a critical supply depot or logistics office.

So yes—the Yellow Flash came, killed a bunch of Iwa-nin, and won the Third Shinobi War.

Which might explain why, despite my brother's status as a jinchūriki being the worst-kept S-Rank secret the Hokage ever classified, nobody seems to suspect that the twins with sunflower-yellow hair and weird blue eyes running around Konoha might be Namikaze Minato's children. If even a whisper of a rumour got out that the infamous Yellow Flash had, sometime in-between casually slaughtering reams of foreign jōnin and playing tag with the Raikage and his brother, somehow reproduced and had children?

I doubt either of us would've lived past infancy.

So the smart thing to do, after finding out you're the daughter of one of the most reviled shinobi in the Elemental Countries, would be to dye your hair, become a civilian, and never even touch an ink brush. Having some of the most dangerous killers in the world wanting me dead wasn't something I wanted hanging over my head for the rest of what would undoubtedly be a short life.

Except—

Some of the most dangerous killers in the world were already after my brother. From traitor Sannin looking to remove the Kyūbi jinchūriki from Konoha's playbook, to paper angels armed with religious fervor and a ludicrous number of explosive tags, to an ancient, undead plant monster with a secret army and standing orders from an actual goddess.

Which made an instant teleportation technique absolutely vital to me if I wanted to keep both Naruto and myself alive.

In order for me to kill the people that needed to die, I needed to gain a lot of power very quickly; and as Suzume-sensei drilled into us during kunoichi lessons, _strength is a double-edged sword._ Already, as a recognized prodigy set to graduate before I turned nine, I'd be attracting attention from anyone paying close attention to Konoha's military strength—which, after the Third Shinobi War, was most of the Elemental Countries. I'd also soon be on the Akatsuki's radar, if I wasn't already; regardless of Uchiha Itachi's true loyalties, he wouldn't have made it into the organization if he refused to give up the identity of Konoha's demon container. Family was always useful leverage, and I was the only family Naruto had.

Which meant that I'd undoubtedly be faced with stronger opponents at some point in the future. Likely before I was ready to protect myself, let alone my little brother. That meant I'd need a reliable exit strategy, something I could use to escape or get to Naruto before either of us could be compromised.

How do you stop a teleporting ninja? _You don't._

* * *

Here's the deal I'd struck with my brother, back when we'd first moved into our one-room apartment and had to feed ourselves from our legacy budget: he'd let me play with his hair and force him to take showers every night and buy him new shoes, and I'd let him eat however many cup noodles he could without breaking the bank or his stomach.

This was, of course, before I found out he was a jinchūriki that could quickly metabolize a resistance to most poisons, let alone bulk boxes of cheap ramen with the consistency of cardboard.

Which was why, after I plopped fried egg into his bowl as he was eating his "breakfast", he knew better than to complain about me staring at his hair while planning on how to make him look as close to the late Namikaze Minato as possible.

There wasn't a lot of information available to Academy students about the sealing arts, besides for handwritten pamphlets written by some instructor on how to open storage scrolls and what not to do with paper bombs. Like most techniques beyond the Academy Three, D-Rank utility ninjutsu and basic chakra control exercises, any useful books on sealing were restricted to active duty ninja and stored in the Konoha Archives. What I had available to me in the Academy library were theoretical tomes or historical records that either skimmed over the specifics, or had entire sections blacked out before they were put on the shelves.

The only way I was going to learn anything about making seals this early on in the game was if I got a ranking ninja to "borrow" some of the manuals from the Archives, or even train me directly. And I had a certain someone in mind that I thought would be able to do both.

That is, were he sufficiently "persuaded" to help.

According to an outdated edition of the Bingo Book I'd managed to find in the Academy library, Hatake Kakashi was both the last student of the Yondaime and a fūinjutsu specialist in his own right—if not quite a master in the skill. My own past-life memories told me that he'd been able to rig up a temporary counter to Orochimaru's Cursed Seal of Heaven pretty quickly after one of his students had been hit with the mark. Having the Sharingan also gave him a selective eidetic memory, and I doubted an A-Rank war veteran would have missed out on the opportunity to memorize his sensei's most famous jutsu.

He might not know how to use the Hiraishin by himself—from what little I understood of the subject, space-time seals of that complexity had to be developed independently to fit the user—but out of all the ninja in the village, he'd be the one most acquainted with the Yellow Flash's way of thinking. If I was to have any hope of replicating the Hiraishin in time for it to really matter, I'd need the son of the White Fang to teach me.

Teach me, _the_ _sister of a jinchūriki_ , how to construct her own seals.

I knew I wasn't the most persuasive child, since I didn't have that many people to practice my infiltration skills on other than Naruto. Not to mention that Sharingan no Kakashi was an A-Rank jōnin, one of Konoha's greatest active military assets, who could probably see right through me if I tried the indirect approach. However, if my memories of him were accurate, he was overly obsessed about the deaths of his comrades, often allowing it to affect his command decisions and performance in the field.

Suzume-sensei likes to say that the heart is the most vulnerable organ, despite the flak jackets and mesh armour that most shinobi tend to wear. If I wanted to have a hope of getting the Yondaime's apprentice to break security protocol? I needed to hit him where it hurt.

My hair was too straight for me to imitate the Yondaime's, and the wrong length and colour if I wanted to pass off as a miniature Uzumaki Kushina. I was, however, more likely than not named after the teammate Hatake had speared through the chest with his own jutsu not a decade ago, and I had a little brother that looked like a brighter version of his father. Naruto was also loud, crass, and loved to play around with the flashy new goggles I'd bought him "as a gift". I just had to convince him to abandon his orange jacket for the day in place of a Uchiha-blue shirt, and somehow track down an ANBU Captain that might be anywhere in the village, if he wasn't out on a mission.

"Hey, Naruto?" I poked him on the forehead. "Want to play a game?"

* * *

I wasn't sure how my past incarnation could have missed, say, the name of Fire Country's capitol, or the makeup of the Konoha Council, or—any actual _dates_ beyond how old my brother might have been at the time. While eerily omniscient whenever it came to the combat capabilities of various ninja, my past-life memories had little to nothing on the casual details that anyone who had actually lived in Konohagakure would have picked up.

Then, of course, there were things like—the name of the brand of shampoo used by one of Hatake Kakashi's summon animals, because _somehow_ that's more relevant than the exact location of Otogakure, or how anybody puzzled out the many esoteric uses of the Rinnegan.

(Floral Green® Minty Rain Forest Mist, to be exact.)

Which, to be fair, was how I was tracking Hatake right now: by using Naruto's inhuman sense of smell to pick up scent trails from heavily trafficked areas of the village. I figured that, while the jōnin might have a habit of masking his scent even when off mission, his ninken were obviously not so careful.

(What kind of tracker summons uses scented shampoo, anyways?)

Our first hit ended up being a dud; Naruto led me into a civilian neighbourhood west of the merchant district, quite a distance away from any of the military buildings or training grounds an active-duty shinobi was likely to frequent. An old woman out for a walk started to yell at my brother until I shot her a glare while visibly toying with my kunai pouch, and we left not long after that; apparently one of Naruto's year-mates at the Academy lived in the area?

"Hey," he asked, "Are you sure we're not looking for Sakura-chan?"

I paused. Wasn't that the name of the oddly-dressed pink-haired kunoichi who'd develop a habit of punching massive craters into everything?

"Not yet, Naruto," I shook my head. "We're after someone else right now."

It took us the rest of the afternoon for my brother to pick up a trail that was relatively fresh and led us anywhere outside the administrative district; by that time, I'd finally convinced him to let me carry his bright orange coat. I'd also purposefully given myself a bloody nose and carefully wiped the mess off using my plain white shirt, so that there was a fist-sized splotch right over where my heart should be.

I took a moment to admire my handiwork. _Perfect_.

"This is a really weird game, onēsan…"

"Hush," I told him. "We're getting closer, aren't we?"

I—probably should have thought to check the Memorial Stone earlier, because that's where we finally found him: slouching in front of the kunai-shaped stone in the middle of a well-kept field adjacent to the Third Training Ground. He had what looked like a bunch of flowers he'd picked off the side of the street, crumpled into a napkin at his feet; half of them looked like colourful weeds. His flak vest was muddy and perforated, the Uzushiogakure crest torn and bloodied as if someone had tried to stab him in the back and partially succeeded. His chakra sparked violently, like a live wire that'd been gnawed on by some wild animal.

I was fairly sure he sensed us coming, but he didn't move until—

"Hey—that's the guy, over there!"

Naruto ran up to the jōnin, who'd visibly stiffened at the sound of my brother's voice. I followed him sedately, curious as to what the Yondaime's apprentice would make of his son. My brother was disruptive and chaotic at the best of times, and was quickly building a reputation as a prankster who could somehow, say, nail the furniture in his Academy classroom to the ceiling overnight without getting caught in a village full of ninja. I didn't think the man had met either of us in person before, as his energy was both curiously distinct and entirely unfamiliar: sharp and bitter on my tongue like a bad spice, or a thin blade. Surely I'd have remembered it, if he'd been part of our ANBU rotation back when we'd still lived in the orphanage?

And my memories of this life happened to stretch as far back as the eve of our birth; Hatake Kakashi definitely hadn't been there with us when we were newborns, when everything I knew of what felt _familiar_ and _safe_ had either spirited away, or compressed itself deep beneath my brother's hara.

He would have been—fourteen, then? Maybe fifteen? Already a war veteran, a decorated officer with extensive field experience. Trusted enough by the Sandaime to go into ANBU, if he hadn't been a part of the black ops unit before then. I'm not sure how long it took him to become A-Ranked, but he'd surely had enough money, from the kinds of missions an experienced jōnin would have taken during a manpower shortage as severe as what Konoha had suffered in the aftermath of the Kyūbi attack. He certainly seemed well enough now, if a little battered from whatever mission he'd clearly just come back from.

I—didn't have time to wonder where he'd been, all our lives. I wasn't here for that.

( _I wasn't._ )

"Hey you!" Naruto shouted, pointing at the jōnin. "Mister Minty Fresh! That's right! You smell _super bad_ , dattebayo!"

At that, the man turned to face us, and—stopped.

Stared at my brother. Then stared at me. His one visible eye froze as he saw my bloodied shirt.

"Yo, onēsan," Naruto elbowed me in the side, "this is the guy, right? Wow, he looks so weird. What happened to his eye? Is that what happens when you're so old—do you just start losing your eyes? Hey, mister! Can you smell anything through that mask?"

He choked.

I stepped forward. "Arigato, shinobi-san. This is my otōto," I ruffled his hair. "Uzumaki Naruto. My name is Rin. Are you Sharingan no Kakashi?"

The question hung in the air. He blinked—once, twice. I tensed when he reached for his kunai pouch, but instead of drawing a weapon, he—cut his own thumb?

That was so rude.

"Hey, hey!" Naruto stomped his feet. "Onēsan asked you a question! You should like, totally answer, or she'll get really mad, and beat you up with her hair, dattebayo!"

His voice was surprisingly hoarse, almost like he'd just been screaming. "…What?"

"Dude, so weird!" Naruto turned to me. "Is that like, all he can say? Like—Kiba's dog? Akamaru? Except taller. 'Cause he's really tall! Yo, Mister," he pointed again. "Are you like, a really tall dog? Is that why your hair's so stinky?"

"No, otōto," I said. "He's not a really tall dog."

"Then why can't he talk?"

The man cleared his throat.

"Mah," he scratched his head. Shifted. "You were looking for me?"

I held up my copy of the Bingo Book. He paled.

"I read a lot about you, Hatake-san!" I chirped, making sure to smile cutely like Naruto did, showing all of my teeth. "It says here you were taught by the Yondaime Hokage, Namikaze Minato, and… that you're really good with seals!"

I then looked down at my feet, and tapped them against each other, like Suzume-sensei had shown me civilian girls did when they were nervous. "Ano… I was wondering… if maybe you could teach me? The instructors at the Academy don't like me very much," which was mostly true, "and I really want to learn! Because, uh," I elbowed Naruto. "My otōto… has a little problem…"

"Eh?! I do?" I elbowed him again. "Ah, yeah, I totally do! Huge problem, dattebayo!"

The man just—kept staring.

I winked at him. (Or, blinked at him, more like, because I was really bad at winking.) "He gets these _stomach pains_ , you see, and I worry about him so much. What if I'm not there and he has a tummy ache? We don't have anyone looking after us, you see."

Naruto took that as his cue and collapsed on the ground, clutching his belly. "Yeah, that's right! Ow, it hurts! A lot, like, so much!"

"So," I shrugged. "I want to make sure that he's safe. And for that… I need to learn fūinjutsu. I think it's a really valuable skill for us to have, don't you think? I wouldn't want him to get… _really loud_. And disrupt the _neighbours_. With his _indigestion_. It's for the good of the village, you know?"

I roughly channeled chakra to my eyes until they stung. When they were good and wet, I tilted my head up at him like a bird. Birds were cute, right? And definitely not dangerous, or overly untrustworthy. "Please, Hatake-san? Will you help me help Naruto-kun?"

It—seemed like the man didn't speak much, because he wasn't saying anything at all. Cold sparks fizzled out in his veins, and his one eye was bloodshot. He just stood there, while my brother rolled around at my feet, babbling about vegetables being terrible and ruining everything. Something about the man's chakra felt ephemeral, like he was falling from a very far height and he wasn't quite sure how he got there.

Did he not get the message? I thought I'd been pretty clear; I knew my brother was a jinchūriki, and I needed him to help me learn fūinjutsu in case something went wrong with Naruto's seal. Didn't he already know about my brother's tenant? My past life memories said that he did, and even without them I could figure out that someone with his security clearance and history with both the Yondaime and the previous demon container would know _something_ about the classified intelligence on my twin. I thought confronting him with our lineage, by connecting us in his mind with people he felt responsible for, would be enough of an emotional connection to—strike that most vulnerable organ. To get him to do what I wanted. Suzume-sensei had assured me that this was a most effective tactic for field interrogations. Wasn't that how this was supposed to work?

I had no idea why some people had to be so _difficult_ —

"Hey!" Naruto sat up. "What! Where'd he go?!"

—And that was when I realized that my brother and I were alone in front of the Memorial Stone.

* * *

It was late, and on a Sunday, which meant that the playground next to the Academy was empty. No bratty children around to tease my brother, and no adults to chase us off like unwelcome strays. Naruto would never admit it to me, but I knew he loved the swings; I let him drag me there and pretend to sulk about for a few minutes before I shoved him into a seat and gave him a push.

(He didn't like that there was no one but me to play with him.)

There were parts of the day, like now, when the usual bustle of Konohagakure would hush to a din. Save for the bars and the night markets in the Lantern District, street vendors would be shutting down their stands and packing up their wares. Those who lived outside the walls in scattered settlements would head towards the gates to get their papers stamped so they could return without hassle in the morning. Of course there were still shinobi flitting about the rooftops, and patrols on the streets that were there more to be visible than actually provide security, which was left to the guard shifts and the black ops. But for the occasional sprinkle of leaves from the excess chakra given off by the less experienced ninja, their flash-steps were virtually silent.

It wasn't quite a peaceful scene; this was a Hidden Village, after all, where moments of quiet tended to precede a knife in the dark, or the drip of poison. Though having lived here all this life, I'd grown accustomed to the feeling of having a sword at the back of my throat, hanging from above by a single hair. How many times did I wake up in the middle of the night, having snuck into my brother's futon after the caretakers had been dismissed and the matron had gone to sleep, only to taste the bitter ring of copper in my mouth, humming in tune with the chakra of an ANBU? We'd grown up watched, and I was ever aware of the thin line between orders to protect us, and to protect others from us.

I couldn't be glad enough, that Naruto had no idea. As much as I thought he deserved to know, whenever a harsh word from a stranger had been too much, I thought—

At least he could still smile, like this. As if being pushed on the swings by his sister in a deserted playground was everything he could want.

That was what was important, here. Not some old man rotting from the heat of a strangled sun, garbed in the robes of so many dead Kage. Not some orphan jōnin whose shock of white hair looked like it'd been run through a live current, even when it was matted with old blood. Not—the name of a girl who'd impaled herself on her teammate's outstretched hand, all for the sake of a village hidden in the shadows of the leaves.

Tonight was—a setback. A misstep. It happened, and neither of us died from it, so things were okay. What if Hatake Kakashi didn't want to teach me? It wasn't the end of the world. I'd seen what that looks like, and the man's hair wasn't long enough for him to do a credible impression of Kaguya. I had other avenues to pursue if I wanted to learn sealing; these not-so-new, not-so-old memories of mine had armed me with some of the village's dirtiest secrets and the sordid histories of its strongest shinobi. I didn't know when Konoha's spymaster would be in the village, but Jiraya was our godfather; if Naruto put up a fit about not having any other relatives in front of the Sandaime, I'm certain the old man would cave. And if that didn't work out, then there was always Orochimaru's former apprentice. Being a recipient of the Cursed Seal of Heaven, Mitarashi Anko would surely know more than your average kunoichi about the sealing arts.

Not to mention she could summon snakes out of her body, and wield them like weaponized limbs.

Which was just, amazing.

"What's your favourite animal, Naruto?" I asked on a whim.

"Eh?" He shifted on his swing, turning to face me. "Um, I dunno. Does Gama-chan count?"

"Well," I started to push him again. "Gama-chan is a toad. So do you like toads?"

He gave me a look. "Onēsan… I hate to burst your bubble, but Gama-chan is a wallet."

"Sure, he's a wallet _now_ ," I argued. "But if you take good care of him, and give him full meals, then maybe he'll become a real toad, someday."

Naruto gaped. "Really?!"

"Really."

"Wow…" he grinned—a big, bright thing that stretched his cheeks. "That's awesome, yeah! I'm going to save up a bunch of money, so Gama-chan can get really fat, and he'll grow up all big and strong and beat up bad guys until they shut up and go away, dattebayo!"

I brought him to a stop, and kissed him on the forehead. "I believe you, otōto."

We left the park under the cover of stars, walking hand-in-hand down the empty streets back to our apartment. We stuck to alleyways next to darkened buildings, cutting through the shinobi district and avoiding the few civilians that were still out this late in this part of the village. In the distance, we could see red lanterns light up, illuminating the southwest of Konoha like bright embers stoking a hot flame; shadows drifted past us, the footsteps of passing ninja audible as a courtesy to the ANBU that followed us home.

"Hey, onēsan," Naruto murmured, as we climbed up the stairs to our floor. "You never said what animal you liked. I told you mine, so you have to tell me yours, y'know? So rude," he shook his head morosely. "Who the hell raised you?"

I stuck out my tongue at him. "A wrinkly, old monkey did, but he didn't pay much attention and dropped me on the head a lot, so all my manners spilled out. Too bad, eh?"

He squawked. "That's terrible! Do—do you need a band-aid, or something? Like, a really big one, so you don't lose anything important?"

I poked his forehead. "That won't work. You'll just have to hug me real tight, Naruto. So you can keep me all together, you hear?"

He tackled me from behind, then scrambled up my back, kicking me in the ribs. "Can do, beanpole. Woah—if you don't eat enough food, will you turn back into a wallet? 'Cause I don't think I'd like you nearly as much if you turned back into a frog, dattebayo."

"Why would I turn into a frog?"

"Because you're not fat enough to be a toad."

I sighed. "Whatever you say, Naruto-kun."

* * *

At the foot of the door to our apartment, I found a small stack of books wrapped in twine. On the very top was a handwritten journal, entitled: _Whirlpool Sealing Arts, by Uzumaki Kushina._

* * *

 **AN:** Friendly reminder that Rin is both seven and an asshole. Don't mess around with other people's PTSD, kids.

 **Next up:** The most horrible, absolute worst training montage, with explosions.


End file.
